LWT - Food Science and Technology 198 (2024) 115954

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LWT
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/lwt

Effect of high hydrostatic pressure pretreatment on physicochemical

properties, bioactive components and antioxidant activities of dehydrated
yam slices
Jian Peng a, Jinghui Lu a, Jingnan Zhu a, Dingjin Li b, Lu Li a, Yuanshan Yu a, Yujuan Xu a, *,
Jijun Wu a, **
a
Sericultural & Agri-Food Research Institute, Guangdong Academy of Agricultural Sciences/Guangdong Key Laboratory of Agricultural Products Processing/Key
Laboratory of Functional Foods, Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, No. 133 Yiheng street., Dongguanzhuang road, Tianhe District, Guangzhou, 510610, China
b
Guangxi Key Laboratory of Health Care Food Science and Technology (Hezhou University), No. 3261 Xiaohe road, Babu District, Hezhou, 542899, China

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: High hydrostatic pressure (HHP) treatment has been widely used to achieve the desired safety and quality of food
High hydrostatic pressure products during the past two decades. In this work, effects of HHP (100–600 MPa) pretreatments on physico­
Dried yam slice chemical properties, bioactive components and antioxidant activities of dehydrated yam slices were studied. The
Quality characteristics
results indicated that HHP pretreatments dramatically improved the hardness, crispness, integrity ratio, and total
Starch granule
color change of the dehydrated yam slices, while significantly inhibited their rehydration ratio when the pressure
Antioxidant capacity
was ≥200 MPa. According to the results of scanning electron microscopy (SEM), optical microscopy (OM), and
polarized optical microscopy (POM), HHP could induce the indentations and cracks of partly starch granules
surface, but without any starch gelatinization. Compared with the control sample, higher total polyphenols
compounds (TPC) and allantoin content were observed in the HHP pretreated samples, and the 200 MPa pre­
treated sample had the highest TPC and allantoin which reached 0.45 mg GAE/g and 5.47 mg/g dry weight,
respectively. Furthermore, the antioxidant analysis showed that 100 and 200 MPa pretreatment could effectively
enhance the antioxidant capacity of the yam slices. The above results suggested that HHP pretreatment, espe­
cially under 200 MPa, could be an appropriate assist for preparation of high-quality dehydrated yam slices.

1. Introduction characteristics, which highly correlated to their market value. As the

Yam, the tuber of Dioscorea opposita Thunb, is the fourth major root
crop after cassava, potato and sweet potato in the world (Akinoso &
Olatoye, 2013). Owing to its unique taste, highly nutritional and func­
tional values, yam is widely consumed as food, vegetable, and tradi­
tional Chinese medicine. Fresh yam easily deteriorates due to its high
moisture content and respiration rate. Drying is an effective method to
extent the shelf-life and retain the functional abilities of yam materials
(Duan et al., 2020; Song et al., 2018). The dehydrated yam slices are the
main form of yam products which commonly considered as a superior
Chinese herbal medicine to invigorate the spleen, kidney, and stomach,
stimulate the production of body fluids, and relieve cough. According to
previous investigation, color, shape integrity and bioactive components
content of the dehydrated yam slices are the most concerned
color, several studies have reported that the enzymatic browning re­
actions are the main reasons that induce brown color to yam slices
during peeling, cutting and drying (Bhandari & Kawabata, 2004; Chi­
laka et al., 2002). As we know, there are several effective methods have
been proposed to protect the color change of yam slices (Gao et al.,
2018; Krishnan et al., 2010; Teoh et al., 2016; Zhang et al., 2019). While
few researches were concerned about the shape integrity and bioactive
components protection. Generally, fresh yams with high crispness are
liable to generate cracks during cutting, which could lead to many
broken slices after drying because of the shrinkage. Comparing with the
dehydrated yam slices with integrated shape, the broken ones contribute
to lower commercial value. Thus, operative pretreatments before cutting
or drying are urgently needed to develop for keeping the integrity of
yam slices after drying with minimum loss of other qualities.

* Corresponding author.
** Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: guoshuxuyujuan@163.com (Y. Xu), guoshuwujijun@163.com (J. Wu).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lwt.2024.115954
Received 5 November 2023; Received in revised form 5 March 2024; Accepted 7 March 2024
Available online 8 March 2024
0023-6438/© 2024 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-
nc/4.0/).
J. Peng et al.
High hydrostatic pressure (HHP) processing is an emerging tech­
nology developed firstly to promote microbiological inactivation in food
with low physicochemical and sensory changes (Bermúdez-Aguirre &
Barbosa-Cánovas, 2011; Oey et al., 2008). Over the past two decades,
HHP has been used to achieve desired effects on texture (Albertos et al.,
2016; de Roeck et al., 2009; Zhang et al., 2020), color (Patras et al.,
2009), flavor (Chen et al., 2019; García-Parra et al., 2020), nutrition
(George et al., 2016; Inada et al., 2020) and other physicochemical
properties (Oliveira et al., 2015; Vega-Gálvez et al., 2011) of fruits and
vegetables or their products. HHP can soften the texture of fresh fruit
and vegetables through disrupting the cell wall structure, enhancing the
cell membrane permeability or modulating the intercellular space
(Eshtiaghi & Knorr, 1993; Gonzalez & Barrett, 2010). Nevertheless, the
impacts of HHP pretreatments on texture and quality of yam tuber and
its dried product are still poorly understood. Whether HHP pretreatment
would soften the fresh yam tubers, and doing so would be to benefit of
obtaining yam slices with superior physicochemical properties remains
unclear.
To comprehensively evaluate the effects of HHP intensity on texture
changes, physicochemical properties, and functional components of
dried yam slices, thus, the HHP (100–600 MPa) was applied on fresh
yam tubers to prepare dehydrated yam slices and their related qualities
were studied in the present work. An attempt has been made to evaluate
the potential application of the HHP technology for obtaining the
dehydrated yam slices with higher integrity ratio and minimal qualities
loss.
2. Materials and methods
2.1. Materials
Fresh Chinese yams (Dioscorea opposita Thunb. cv. gaozhouhuan­
shan) of similar sizes (length about 70–100 cm, diameter about 6–10
cm) were obtained from a local farm in Gaozhou, a city of Guangdong
province, China. All these materials were transported to the laboratory
within 24 h at ambient temperature (15–24 ◦ C) and stored at 4 ± 1 ◦ C
with 80~90% relative humidity for less than 1 week before usage. The
initial moisture content of raw yam tuber (71.8 ± 1.2 g/100g wet basis)
was determined by oven method until constant weigh obtained (AOAC,
1990).
2.2. High hydrostatic pressure pretreatment and drying
Before processing, the yam tubers were washed for removal of dirt
and soil with tap water. Then, the whole tubers were cut into several
segments with length about 30 cm and divided into 5 parts, each part
including 4–5 segments. All the raw samples were vacuum sealed using
plastic bags (polyamide (PA) + cast polypropylene (CPP), 30 cm × 40
cm) and treated with pilot scale HHP equipment (SHPP-57DZM-600/
57L, Sanshuihe Technology Co., Ltd., Taiyuan, China) as shown in
Fig. S1. According to Sun et al. (2019), the pretreatment conditions of
different pressures (100, 200, 400, and 600 MPa) at 25 ◦ C for holding 10
min with the rate of pressure increase 200 MPa/min and the release time
5 s were applied. The holding time did not include the pressure increase
and release times. The raw sample without HHP pretreatment was set as
control.
All the HHP pretreated group samples and the control group sample
were peeled and cut into 5 mm thick slices, then dried in a hot air dryer
(101-3ARS, Shanghai Ke Heng Industrial Co. Ltd., Shanghai, China) at
60 ◦ C with an air velocity of 2.1 m/s until the moisture content less than
12.0 g/100g wet basis. The dried yam slices for each group were divided
into two parts. One for texture, color, and rehydration ratio analysis, the
other was ground into powders and passed through 40 mesh sieves for
microstructure, active components and antioxidant activity determina­
tion. Then, all the prepared samples were sealed in polyester/aluminium
foil/polypropylene laminated bags to avoid moisture absorption. And
2
LWT 198 (2024) 115954
stored in a freezer at − 18 ◦ C until further analysis.
2.3. Texture
Texture of the fresh or dehydrated yam slices with HHP pretreatment
were measured using a Texture Analyzer (TA. XT2i/50, Stable Micro
System Ltd., Surry, UK), which fitted with a cutting probe (HDP/BSK,
Blade set with knife). The testing parameters were set according to our
previous work (Peng et al., 2018), pre-test, test, and post-test speeds
were 2.0, 1.0, and 2.0 mm/s, respectively. The trigger force was set 25 g
and the penetration distance was set 20.0 mm. The highest peak force
and break distance that defined as hardness and crispness of the sample,
respectively. The shorter of break distance, the higher of crispness of the
dried yam slices. Eight replications were conducted for each group.
2.4. Color
Color of the fresh or dehydrated yam slices with HHP pretreatment
were evaluated through a colorimeter (D25LT, Hunter Lab Co. Ltd.,
Virginia, America) according to our previous work (Peng et al., 2018) for
five replications. The total color difference (ΔE) was calculated using the
following equation (1).
√̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅
ΔE = ΔL∗2 + Δa∗2 + Δb∗2 (1)
where, ΔE is total color difference, which denotes the color change
compared to that of the control sample. And ΔL*, Δa*, Δb* are changes
in lightness, redness and yellowness of the samples.
2.5. Integrity ratio
Integrity ratio of yam slices is defined as the proportion of number of
integrated slices to total number of dried slices in each treated group
involved about 300 slices.
2.6. Rehydration ratio
Rehydration ratio (RR) of the dehydrated yam slices pretreated by
HHP was measured as described by Gamboa-Santos et al. (2013), and
the RR was calculated as:
RR = Mr /Md (2)
where, Mr and Md are the weights of rehydrated and dehydrated yam
slices, respectively.
2.7. Scanning electron microscopy, optical microscopy and polarized
optical microscopy
Morphological features of dehydrated yam powders were observed
using a scanning electron microscope (SEM, SU8010, Hitachi Co.,
Tokoyo, Japan). The images (magnification × 1500) of the specimens
were collected under high vacuum at a 15 kV accelerated voltage and
8.8 mm working distance.
Powder samples were also observed through an optical microscope
(OLYMPUS BX51, Beijing, China) equipped with ordinary and polarized
light system. The optical and polarized optical images were captured at
magnification × 500 using a CCD camera. Before observing, a small
amount of yam powder (about 0.05 g) was mixed with 4 mL distilled
water and a drop of mixture was placed on an object slide covered with a
coverslip (Chen et al., 2017).
2.8. Soluble polysaccharide
Soluble polysaccharide (SP) was extracted by hot water method
modified with previous study (Yang et al., 2015). In detail, yam powder
about 1.0 g was placed into centrifuge tube and mixed with 40 mL
J. Peng et al.
distilled water. The mixture was incubated in a shock water bath for 3 h
at 50 ◦ C. After incubation, the slurry was centrifuged at 8000 rpm for 15
min to collect the supernatant, and then the supernatant was concen­
trated to 10 mL using a rotary evaporator under 40 ◦ C. The concentrate
was mixed with 4-fold volume of ethanol, and was then kept for 2 h at
4 ◦ C. The solution was centrifuged to obtain the precipitate. The pre­
cipitate was dried in a vacuum drier until its constant weight. The SP
content was calculated as mg/g dry weight (D.W.) of sample.
2.9. Preparation of extract for determination of total phenolic
compounds, allantoin, and antioxidant activity
Extraction procedure was conducted following our previous work
(Peng et al., 2019). Yam powder about 1.0 g for each treatment was
placed into test tube and mixed with 10 mL 0.8 mL/mL methanol in
conjunction with ultrasonic treatment (40 kHz for 20 min) at room
temperature. Then, the mixture was centrifuged at 8000 rpm for 5 min,
the supernatant was collected. The extraction and collection procedures
were repeated two times again. All the collected extracts were concen­
trated using a vacuum rotary evaporator at 40 ◦ C and diluted to 10 mL
with 0.8 mL/mL methanol. All the extracts were stored at − 20 C for
◦
following testing.
2.10. Total phenolic compounds
Total phenolic compounds (TPC) of the dehydrated yam slices were
measured using Folin–Ciocalteu reagent in accordance with the method
of Peng et al. (2019). The yam powder extracts (400 μL) were added 1
mL distilled water and 200 μL Folin–Ciocalteu reagent. After 15 s vortex,
the mixture was allowed to react at room temperature for 5 min, after
which 400 μL 0.2 g/g Na2CO3 solution was added. The absorbance of
above reaction solution was read at 765 nm using a UV–visible spec­
trophotometer (UV-1900i, Shimadzu, Tokyo, Japan). The total poly­
phenol was calibrated using the linear equation and expressed as mg
gallic acid equivalent (GAE/g D.W.).
2.11. Allantoin
Allantoin was determined using a HPLC system (LC-20AT, Shimadzu
Corp., Tokyo, Japan) coupled with a photodiode array detector. Sepa­
ration was carried out using a C18 column (Wondasil, 250 × 4.6 mm, 5
μm). The mobile phase consisted of ethanol and H2O (10/90), flow rate
set as 0.5 mL/min, procedure set as 30 min, injection volume was 10 μL
and column temperature was controlled at 30 ◦ C. The wavelength 224
nm was selected as the analysis condition. The standard for allantoin
determination was purchased from Shanghai Yuanye Bio-Technology
Co., Ltd.
2.12. Diosgenin
Diosgenin was extracted according to (Selim & Jaouni, 2015) with
some modifications. In detail, dried yam powder about 5.0 g was
dispersed in 150 mL of methanol for 1 h with 350 W ultrasonic treat­
ment. Then the mixture was filtered and extracted with petroleum ether
(50 mL) for triplicate. Combined three times of petroleum ether extracts
and rinsed with 0.5 g/g alkali for three times. The extract was passed
through a column of Na2SO4 to remove any extra water. Then the extract
was evaporated to dryness using a rotary evaporator at 40 ◦ C. The dried
crude extract was solubilized in 1 mL of menthol before determination.
A HPLC method was used to analyze the concentration of diosgenin. The
conditions were as follows: HPLC column, C18 (Wondasil, 250 × 4.6 mm,
5 μm); injection volume, 10 μL; mobile phase: 0.9 mL/mL menthol; flow
rate, 1 mL/min; detected wave, 203 nm; column temperature, 35 ◦ C.
3
LWT 198 (2024) 115954
2.13. Antioxidant capacity
Antioxidant activities of the dried yam samples were evaluated
through the 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) radical scavenging
activity, 2, 2-azinobis-(3-ethylbenzthiazoline-6-sulphonate (ABTS)
radical scavenging activity, and ferric reducing antioxidant power
(FRAP) as reported by Kowalska et al. (2018) and Wojdylo et al. (2016).
All these three methods standard curves were obtained using different
concentrations of Trolox, and results were expressed as Trolox equiva­
lents (μmol/g D.W.). In DPPH assay, 2.0 mL sample extracts prepared
before was mixed with 4 mL of 100 μmol/L DPPH ethanol solution. The
mixture was allowed to stand for 30 min in the dark at room tempera­
ture, and the absorbance was read at 517 nm. In ABTS assay, equal
quantities of 2.45 mmol/L K2S2O8 solution and 7 mmol/L ABTS were
mixed to obtain ABTS•+ solution, and stored at ambient temperature for
16 h in the dark. Before determination, the ABTS•+ solution was diluted
with 0.8 mL/mL ethanol to obtain an absorption of 0.70 ± 0.01 at 734
nm. Then, the properly diluted sample extracts (400 μL) were reacted
with 3.6 mL of freshly diluted ABTS•+ solution for 6 min, then the
absorbance of the mixture at 734 nm was measured. In FRAP assay,
FRAP reagent was prepared and warmed at 37 ◦ C before use. The diluted
sample extracts (100 μL) were mixed with 3 mL of FRAP reagent and
incubated at 37 ◦ C for 10 min, then the absorbance at 593 nm was
recorded.
2.14. Statistical analysis
All the experiments were conducted in triplicate unless specified.
Data were analyzed using the least significant difference (LSD) test (P <
0.05) performed with SPSS Statistics Version 19 (IBM Corporation,
Chicago, USA), applying one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) and
Tukey’s multiple comparison tests.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Texture and color
Texture of the HHP pretreated yam slices and final dehydrated
samples are presented in Table 1. The hardness of the HHP pretreated
yam slices was much lower than the control group, and the minimum
hardness (20.42 N) was observed in the 200 MPa pretreated yam slices
and then the hardness increased with the rising of pressure. This is in
consistent with the phenomenon demonstrated by Sun et al. (2019), who
found that asparagus lettuce showed a lowest hardness treated at 300
MPa and then increased at 500 MPa. The HHP induced texture softening
always be explained as related to cells’ mechanical damage and enzy­
matic and non-enzymatic transformations of cell wall polysaccharides
(Oey et al., 2008). All HHP pretreated yam slices obtained longer break
distance than the control group, which means that all the yam slices
after HHP pretreatments (100–600 MPa) lost their crispness and the loss
increased with rising pressure. As for the final dehydrated yam slices,
except for 100 MPa pretreated sample, the HHP pretreated groups
exhibited much higher hardness than the control group, and the highest
hardness was detected in 600 MPa pretreated group which reached
127.94 N. This could be owing to the tightly connected yam tissue
morphology after 600 MPa HHP pretreated and drying. Furthermore,
the tightly connected tissue would be broken when probe moved down
with a short distance during texture testing, therefore the HHP pre­
treated and dried samples presented higher crispness (Table 1).
Color is considered as a fundamental quality attribute no matter for
fresh-cut or dried yam slices. The color changes of HHP pretreated yam
slices are given in Table 1. The L* value of the HHP (≥200 MPa) pre­
treated slices were lower than those of control and 100 MPa pretreated
samples, while the a* and b* values showed no significance between the
control and HHP pretreated samples. The color changes of the final dried
yam slices are also summarized in Table 1. Comparing with the control
J. Peng et al. LWT 198 (2024) 115954

Table 1
Texture and color of fresh, high hydrostatic pressure (HHP) pretreated, and HHP pretreated and dehydrated yam slices.
Sample Texture* Color§

After HHP pretreatment After HHP pretreatment After HHP pretreatment After HHP pretreatment and drying
and drying

Hardness Crispness Hardness Crispness L* a* b* ΔE L* a* b* ΔE

(N) (mm) (N) (mm)

Control 45.57 1.25 54.31 1.01±0.05c 87.42 -1.57 10.40 — 95.25 -2.32 9.97 —
±1.88c ±0.15a ±4.43a ±0.34b ±0.17a ±0.49a ±0.11d ±0.18a ±0.27a
100 33.81 1.59 53.40 0.91 87.30 -1.75 11.56 1.20 93.62 -2.15 11.35 2.17
MPa ±2.87b ±0.16b ±3.81a ±0.04bc ±0.40b ±0.10a ±0.17b ±0.11a ±0.55c ±0.14a ±0.56a ±0.73a
200 20.42 1.95±0.14c 84.80 0.90 83.82 -1.72 10.19 3.61 92.71 -2.15 13.84 4.64
MPa ±2.09a ±6.51b ±0.04b ±0.50a ±0.06a ±0.23a ±0.49b ±0.64bc ±0.09a ±0.71b ±0.92b
400 23.65 2.41 106.26 0.84 82.95 -1.65 11.52 4.64 91.10 -1.90 16.20 7.54
MPa ±2.19a ±0.11d ±6.29c ±0.04ab ±0.56a ±0.06a ±0.67b ±0.30c ±1.10b ±0.35a ±0.53c ±0.86c
600 25.65 2.41 127.94 0.76 83.23 -1.64 9.76 4.25 87.91 -1.94 17.98 10.91
MPa ±3.10a ±0.14d ±8.74d ±0.06a ±0.88a ±0.08a ±0.21a ±0.85c ±0.93a ±0.25a ±0.75d ±0.47d

Note: * Values are expressed as mean value ± SD (n = 8). § Values are expressed as mean value ± SD (n = 5). Different lower-case letters indicate a significant
difference within the same column (p < 0.05).

group, the HHP pretreated samples obtained lower L* value and higher 20.42 N, crispness 1.95 mm) of yam tubers was obtained after 200 MPa
b* value. In other words, HHP pretreatments decreased brightness but pressure pretreatment. In practice, it tends to generate less cracks during
increased yellowness of the final dried yam slices. The decrease of L* cutting when the fruit and vegetable materials own soft tissue, thus the
induced by HHP could be explained the promotion of oxidative sharp increase of integrity ratio of dried yam slices was observed.
browning through activating polyphenoloxidase (PPO) (Luo et al.,
2015). In general, if the total color change (ΔE) between two samples 3.3. Rehydration ratio
was less than 5, no obvious color change could be observed visually.
Hence, no visual color change could be observed for the fresh and HHP Rehydration curves of the dried yam slices are given in Fig. 2.
pretreated yam samples, and HHP pretreatments no more than 200 MPa Remarkable increases of rehydration ratio (RR) were observed in all the
will not contribute visual color change for the final dried yam slices. dried samples during early rehydration process (<210 min). The sam­
ples pretreated with 200, 400, and 600 MPa taken much longer time to
reach rehydration equilibration than 100 MPa pretreated and control
3.2. Integrity ratio
samples, indicating that 100 MPa pretreated and control samples owned
faster rehydration rate. Furthermore, the final RR of 100 MPa pretreated
Shape is an important visual attribute that affects dehydrated yam
and untreated samples were 2.11 and 2.12, respectively, which were
slices commercial value. The integrity ratios of the dehydrated yam
significantly higher (p < 0.05) than the 200, 400, and 600 MPa pre­
slices pretreated with different HHP are shown in Fig. 1. Compared with
treated samples that with the final RR were 2.00, 1.97, and 1.84,
the control group, higher integrity ratio was observed in all the HHP
respectively. The rehydration rate and final RR represent water ab­
pretreated samples and the highest value was obtained in 600 MPa
sorption rate and water absorption capability of dried plant samples,
group which reached to 96.77%. Specifically, a sharp increase occurred
mainly relate and depend on the pretreatments, material properties,
from 100 to 200 MPa group samples which the integrity ratio from
drying and rehydration conditions (Ricce et al., 2016). In this case, HHP
55.69% upgraded to 86.23%, thus a significant improvement of
pretreatment could lead the yam tissue densification, therefore, less
appearance quality of HHP (≥200 MPa) pretreated samples was ac­
micro-channels formation during drying. And for this reason, the weaker
quired. As mentioned before, yam slices are easy to be generated cracks
during cutting as its crumbly texture, and the crackled yam slices would
be broken during drying because of shrinkage. The soft tissue (hardness

Fig. 1. The integrity rate of the dried yam slices pretreated with different HHP. Fig. 2. The RR of the dried yam slices pretreated with different HHP. RR:
HHP: high hydrostatic pressure. rehydration ratio.

4
J. Peng et al.
entrance of water during rehydration process.
3.3.1. Scanning electron microscopy, optical microscopy and polarized
optical microscopy
The scanning electron microscopy (SEM) images of the yam powders
prepared with different HHP pretreatments are presented in Fig. 3.
Starch granules are clearly seen in all yam powders, and the no-starch
components are dispersed or attached to starch granules. Overall,
starch granules pretreated with different HHP exhibited similarly and
presented typical oval or spherical shape. The surface of the yam starch
granules is normally smooth, and the morphology is consistent with
previous researches on yam starch (Chen et al., 2017; Liu et al., 2020).
But it should be noted that subtle distinctions were still observed on the
surface of yam starch granules among different pretreated samples. As
pointed by the red circles in Fig. 3, slight indentations were observed on
the surface of all HHP pretreated yam starch granules, and cracks (the
red arrows pointed) were also emerged when the pressure was ≥200
MPa. With the increasing of pretreated pressure, the indentations and
cracks became more remarkable. This indicated that compressional
deformation between starch granules could have been occurred in fresh
yam tubers.
The optical microscopy (OM) and polarized optical microscopy
Fig. 3. SEM, OM, and POM images of yam powders prepared with different HHP pretreatment. Circles and arrows in the figure point the surface indentations and
cracks, respectively, which formed on the starch granules of yam. SEM: Scanning electron micrographs; OM: optical microscopy; OPM: polarized optical microscopy.
5
LWT 198 (2024) 115954
(POM) images of the yam powders pretreated with different HHP are
also shown in Fig. 3. Whole and plump starch granules and obvious
polarized cross were observed in all the samples no matter the HHP
pretreatment or not, which suggested that no gelatinization was
occurred in these yam starch. This phenomenon was completely
different with the yam powder prepared by microwave-drying (Chen
et al., 2017).
3.4. Soluble polysaccharide and total phenolic compounds
Soluble polysaccharide (SP) and total phenolic compounds (TPC) are
the main bioactive components in yam tubers, which are expected to be
retained after processing. The effects of HHP pretreatments on SP and
TPC of the dried yam slices showed in Fig. 4. The highest SP was ob­
tained in 100 MPa pretreated yam slices and reached 31.02 mg/g D.W.,
which was much higher than the control sample (26.56 mg/g D.W.).
HHP can alter cell membrane diffusivity, elevate cell permeability,
thereby, increasing the solvent penetration into cell and improving the
extraction yield of polysaccharide (Rostamabadi et al., 2023). While the
pressure was ≥200 MPa, the SP of yam slices decreased with the increase
of pretreated pressure, and the SP reduced to 21.87 mg/g D.W. when the
pressure up to 600 MPa. Liu et al. (2013) have reported a similar effect of
J. Peng et al.
Fig. 4. The SP and TPC content of the dried yam slices pretreated with different
HHP. SP: soluble polysaccharide; TPC: total phenolic compounds.
HHP treatment (300–600 MPa) on the extractability of water-soluble
polysaccharides (WSP) from mango pulp. The decrease in WSP might
be attributed to the pressure resistance of mango pectin methyl esterase,
which could induce the hydrolysis of WSP.
TPC content was significantly improved by HHP pretreatments (p <
0.05), and the highest TPC content was obtained from 200 MPa pre­
treated and dried sample which reached 0.45 mg GAE/g D.W.,
approximately 45.16% higher than the control sample (0.31 mg GAE/g
D.W.). Similar behavior was observed by Santos et al. (2022), in their
study on plum, in which approximately 21% increase of TPC was
observed in the dried sample pretreated with 400 MPa. The increase in
TPC can be explained by the deprotonation of charged groups, disrup­
tion of salt bridges, and hydrophobic bonds, resulting in conformational
changes, altering membrane permeability, and disruption of cell walls
and cell organelles that favoring the extraction of phenolic compounds
from plant tissue (Salazar et al., 2021).
3.5. Diosgenin and allantoin content
Diosgenin and allantoin, secondary metabolites of Dioscorea, both
are important bioactive phytochemicals. Diosgenin is a traditional pre­
cursor of most hormonal drugs in the pharmaceutical industry, whereas,
allantoin has antidiabetic and antioxidant activity and promotes wound
healing (Wang et al., 2023). Compared with the control sample (0.51
mg/g D.W.), the diosgenin content of the dried samples pretreated with
HHP showed remarkable decrease (Fig. 5). Cheng et al. (2021) reported
Fig. 5. The diosgenin and allantoin content of the dried yam slices pretreated
with different HHP.
6
LWT 198 (2024) 115954
that the biosynthesis of diosgenin from the precursor cholesterol was
catalyzed by two P450 enzymes: C-16,22-dihydroxylase and C-26 hy­
droxylase. The activity of these two enzymes might be inhibited during
HHP processes, therefore, the decrease of diosgenin occurred in those
HHP (100–600 MPa) pretreatment samples. Different from the dio­
sgenin, the allantoin content of the dried samples pretreated with HHP
was much higher than the control sample (2.48 mg/g D.W.), and the
highest allantoin content was obtained from 200 MPa pretreated yam
slice and reached 5.47 mg/g D.W. Thomas and Schrader (1981) parsed
that the synthesis of allantoin in yam mainly via purine degradation
process, which involved in some enzymes including xanthine oxidase,
uricase, and allantoinase. The higher allantoin content in those HHP
treated samples might be due to the activity of these enzymes were
improved by HHP pretreatments, especially 200 MPa. However, the
specific mechanism of diosgenin and allantoin alteration after HHP
pretreatment is still unclear, the activity changes of diosgenin and
allantoin related enzymes need be researched in our following work.
3.6. Antioxidant capacities
Antioxidant capacities of the dried yam samples measured by DPPH
scavenging activity, ABTS scavenging activity, and ferric reducing
antioxidant power (FRAP) are shown in Fig. 6. The same pretreated yam
sample exhibited distinct antioxidant capacities when evaluated with
above three different analysis methods. It might be due to the existence
of numerous radicals, and the different physical and chemical charac­
teristics of the oxidants, which relate to different reaction mechanisms.
In general, ABTS has the highest free radical values as its applicable to
both hydrophilic and lipophilic antioxidants, whereas, DPPH only reacts
to lipophilic and FRAP only reacts to hydrophilic antioxidants (Capa­
noglu et al., 2020). In terms of DPPH scavenging capacity, 100 and 200
MPa pretreated yam samples exhibited much higher (p < 0.05) antiox­
idant capacities than the control, 400, and 600 MPa pretreated samples.
As for ABTS, all the HHP pretreated samples showed higher (p < 0.05)
ABTS scavenging capacities than the control sample. It is worth
mentioning that 200 MPa pretreated sample revealed the highest anti­
oxidant capacity (0.99–1.30 μmol/g D.W.) regardless of which analyt­
ical methos were adopted. Usually, antioxidant capacity is highly
correlated with the presence of bioactive compounds in a sample (Yuan
et al., 2022). In this case, the highest TPC content was also observed in
the 200 MPa pretreated sample.
Fig. 6. DPPH, ABTS, and FRAP antioxidant capacities of the dried yam slices
pretreated with different HHP. DPPH: 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl; ABTS:
2,2′-azino-bis(3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulfonic acid); FRAP: ferric ion
reducing antioxidant power.
J. Peng et al.
4. Conclusion
Results of different HHP pretreatments on the physicochemical
properties, bioactive components, and antioxidant activities of dehy­
drated yam slices, indicated that 200 MPa HHP pretreatment applied
before yam cutting and drying was an excellent method for preparing
high quality dried yam slices. Despite inhibiting the rehydration ratio,
200 MPa HHP pretreatment could dramatically improve the hardness,
crispness, integrity ratio, and the total color change of dehydrated yam
slices when compared with the control sample. HHP pretreatments
would not induce any starch gelatinization according to the result of
POM, further more increased the TPC and allantoin content when
compared to unpretreated one, and both the highest TPC and allantoin
were detected in the 200 MPa pretreated sample. The antioxidant
analysis showed that 100 and 200 MPa pretreatment could effectively
enhanced the antioxidant activity of the dried yam slices. The results of
the present work are important as a reference for improving the whole
quality in dehydrated yam slices produce industry.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Jian Peng: Writing – original draft, Project administration, Investi­
gation. Jinghui Lu: Validation, Methodology, Formal analysis. Jingnan
Zhu: Validation, Software, Data curation. Dingjin Li: Resources,
Investigation. Lu Li: Writing – review & editing, Software, Formal
analysis. Yuanshan Yu: Conceptualization. Yujuan Xu: Supervision,
Conceptualization. Jijun Wu: Writing – review & editing, Visualization.
Declaration of competing interest
All the authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Data availability
Data will be made available on request.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by Science and Technology Plaining Project
of Guangzhou (No. 2023A04J0826), the Special fund for the rural
vitalization strategy of Guangdong province, Science and Technology
Plaining Project of Maoming (No. 2022S029), the Special fund for
Guangxi Key Laboratory of Health Care Food Science and Technology
(Hezhou University) (NO. GXKYSPS202207), and the Special fund for
Scientific innovation strategy-construction of high-level Academy of
Agricultural Science (NO. R2022PY-QF004).
Appendix A. Supplementary data
Supplementary data to this article can be found online at https://doi.
org/10.1016/j.lwt.2024.115954.
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